Get ready for the "Sobhraj" battle

Now that the true identity of the character played by Randeep Hooda in Main Aur Charles is out in the open the makers are prepared for a long legal dispute with Sobhraj. When director Prawaal Raman had incepted the project 5 years ago with Sanjay Dutt in the lead, Sobhraj had objected through his lawyers. With director Prawaal Raman’s film on the life and adventures of a Charles Sobhraj-like con-man now being titled Main Aur Charles, the film’s team is now getting ready for a possible legal battle with the real Sobhraj. Earlier Prawaal and the team maintained that their film was not based on Sobhraj’s life. But now Prawaal says his film does have elements from Sobraj’s life. “We’ve taken some incidents from Sobhraj’s life, but not his life. That didn’t interest me. We’ve actually based the screenplay on the charge-sheet prepared by the cop in charge, Mr Amod Kanth.” Kanth is played in Main Aur Charles by the English Vinglish actor Adil Hussain. Says Prawaal, “The film is more about the investigation carried out by two cops Amod Kanth, who is my uncle, played by Adil Hussain, and another cop Madhukar Zende played by Nandu Yadav of Harishchandrachi Factory. I’d say the film is more about these two cops. That’s why we’ve titled the film Main Aur Charles. The ‘Main’ refers to the cop-heroes.” However Prawaal is ready to take on Sobhraj in any legal battle. “If I was afraid of legal repercussions I wouldn’t have made this film. From the time we announced the film there have been murmurs of a certain party taking us to court. We aren’t scared. In fact I had titled the film Charles & I initially. We have our facts right. And our film is not an attempt to malign anyone but to put facts forwards. We are ready to face a legal battle. By the way, what happened to the others who had made announcements about films about Sobhraj?” There we go! Prawaal Raman takes a dig at the Sobhraj biopic directed by Anurag Kashyap and written by Farukh Dhondy.